VIDEO: Central Michigan uses strong second half to hammer Ball State

@natejschneiderThere is the old basketball adage that says “live by the 3-pointer, die by the 3-pointer.”

Central Michigan University men’s basketball coach Keno Davis admitted that at the outset of the season, he was worried this Chippewas team might carry that motto as there were some strong outside shooters on the roster but not a lot of size inside.

Yet on several occasions during the 2012-13 campaign, Central Michigan has proven that when the 3-pointers are not falling it has more ways to win games.

Another example of that was Saturday night at McGuirk Arena as the outside shots were mostly errant by CMU, but it made up for it by finding plenty of other ways to score as it topped Ball State by a final of 71-57 in front of a loud attendance of 2,043.

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“I honestly felt coming into this season because of the guards we have and the lack of size especially after Zach Saylor’s injury, that on nights where we couldn’t hit the 3-pointer we would have a tough night,” Davis said. “That most likely we would come out of there with a loss. This isn’t the first night where we haven’t shot well and found a way to win.”

It is the second straight game Central Michigan (9-8, 2-2 Mid-American Conference) has shot poorly from 3-point range as it hit only 5-of-24 from long-distance, while four of those makes were from freshman Blake Hibbitts who went 4-of-9. But the Chippewas made up for it by hitting 22-of-36 on its 2-point attempts and created 17 turnovers which helped lead to many transition baskets.

The first half may have ended at 37-35 in favor of Ball State (7-9, 1-3), but Davis liked what he saw out of his team in that it wore down the Cardinals’ short rotation and it paid dividends in the second half when Central Michigan outscored the opposition 36-20.

He pointed to the high amount of minutes Ball State’s Jauwan Scaife (37) and Majok Majok (34) played to tell the story of how tired legs played a role in turning the game’s tides.

“It wasn’t so much what we did (differently), but it’s what we did in the first half,” said Davis. “We ran so much, we provided pressure, we had some continuity offensively even though we didn’t get as much out of it. I think fatigue took its toll. So in the second half, they had some guys that had been playing a lot of minutes. You know, 37 and 34 minutes is a lot of minutes to play against us. That shows how talented those guys are, but it also takes its toll. I think our work in the first half, even though we were down two points, really helped us down the stretch.”

Central Michigan opened up as much as an 18-13 lead in the first half following a 3-pointer by Hibbitts, yet the Cardinals responded and grabbed a 33-29 lead of their own with three-plus minutes to go in the half via a 3-pointer courtesy of Marcus Posley.

After heading into the locker room with the 37-35 advantage, Ball State managed to push it to 41-35 by scoring the first four points after the break.

The next stretch of basketball was some of the best the Chippewas played all night as they went on a 13-2 run, started by a free throw from senior Kyle Randall after a steal and completed with an emphatic dunk from freshman Derrick Richardson which gave the hosts a 48-43 lead at the 11:28 mark.

The six freshmen who saw minutes combined for 33 of CMU’s 71 points, led by Hibbitts’ 12 points on the four 3-pointers.

“I’m very proud of them,” Randall said of the freshmen. “It’s not very often you see freshmen getting minutes like this. There is a lot of pressure on them and they’ve definitely shown great maturity. All of them are doing whatever they can to help this team win.”

Following the lengthy run, Central Michigan never trailed again in the game.

Ball State continued to hang in it and trailed just 52-49 with under eight minutes left before the Chippewas again pulled away by scoring the next five points. Four straight points from Olivier Mbaigoto made it a 57-49 ballgame.

Mbaigoto, going at it once again versus players a few inches taller than him, ended his night with 12 points along with six boards and three blocked shots in just 18 minutes before fouling out late,

“His energy that he brings is something that we need,” Davis said of Mbaigoto. “On the nights he hasn’t played well, it’s because he hasn’t been healthy enough to play well. You saw him tonight with some of the blocked shots and rebounds he had. He’s a small forward or maybe a small power forward who every night is going up against 6-foot-10 or 6-11 players who are going 26 or 270. So he’s playing out of position. But he won’t say a word about it and does anything the team needs. He’s also just a tough matchup for them because of his quickness. We needed him there tonight and a couple of his big defensive plays were key.”

The good news for Mbaigoto is that he will receive more help in the future from 6-9 center Zach Saylor, who played in his first game since late November when he suffered a knee injury. Saylor saw action for four minutes, missing a hook shot and pulling down a rebound as he tries to ease his way back into the rotation.

The Cardinals once again trimmed their deficit back to 59-54 on a Scaife 3-pointer, but Hibbitts answered with a 3-pointer as he proved to be the lone CMU player who could consistently hit the outside shot all night. Finis Craddock hit the only other 3-pointer for the Chippewas.

Central Michigan continued to pull away from there as it outscored Ball State 12-3 over the last 2:49.

Now at 2-2 in the Mid-American Conference, Central Michigan is back into a fist-place tie in the West Division as Toledo fell 76-67 at Ohio. Davis says is not really sure what to expect in the upcoming weeks.

“I’m not sure how good of a ballclub we are and I’m not sure how good we can become,” said Davis. “But I think in year one and being in transition with six freshmen in our rotation, that is a good thing that we don’t know what our ceiling is. Kyle Randall has gotten a lot of publicity and rightfully so, but I think you can look at our roster tonight and see four or five guys that really stepped up as leaders for us.”

Randall scored 16 points to lead CMU, while adding five rebounds along with three assists and two steals. Craddock chipped in eight points and five rebounds in 25 minutes of action.

Majok paced the Cardinals with 14 points and 11 boards, while Scaife put in 13.

Central Michigan returns to McGuirk Arena Wednesday when it hosts Northern Illinois at 7 p.m. It will be the second game of a three-game homestand for the Chippewas.

“I think when you are picked 12th, you are trying to scratch out every victory you can get,” Davis added. “So we aren’t really looking ahead right now, whereas in another year where you might be picked second or third you might look at a stretch and think it could be a good opportunity to make a move in the conference. For us, there is no pressure on us. We just come out and see how hard we can work, then after the game we’re going to be disappointed if we lose. But we’re more disappointed if we don’t feel like we outworked the other team. Where that puts us in the conference and in the conference tournament, we’re not concerned about because we know we’ll have a seed. We know we’ll be playing in the postseason and that’s something we can gear toward by saying, ‘How good can we be then?’”